The Land - the early years...

We bought the land in the late 90s.  It is slightly less than 40 acres and is located in the NE part of AZ in Apache County.  For many years we used it as a camping location.  It is off of county maintained roads and difficult to get to when it rains because of that fact.  The area is high desert and sits at an elevation of approx 5000 feet.  The soil is sandy and there are many juniper trees around.  A wash along the western edge of the land leads to the Little Colorado River.  There is evidence of prehistoric settlement on our land.  We have found pottery shards, spear points, and other artifacts.

The first improvement we made to the land occurred in 1999.  We paid $10,000 to have a well dug.  The water table is at 500' but once tapped the static water level sits at around 180'.  We decided early on that we wanted to be off grid, so we purchased a SureFlo submersible solar pump and two 75 watt solar panels.  With flowing water we were able to camp quite comfortably for many years.

The well

Originally we were planning on building an Earthship until we realized that we were not able to do the labor ourselves.  Pounding tires is really hard work and with two bad backs in the family it was too much.  That's not to say that we didn't try...

But we soon realized that we had to be more realistic about our abilities.  All of the preconceived notions you have about what you think you want eventually are to be adjusted to fit your time, abilities, budget and goals.  It took many years before we took the next big steps in improving The Land....to be continued...